Page 62 of Harnessed in Gold

I blow out a breath as I lean back in my chair. “The ultimate marketing angle.”

“He says it’s proof the gods have chosen him to rule.”

Thwonk. The apartment door bangs open, and in marches Rime, Topaz strutting in behind him.

“Ah! There’s my little psychic.” Rime steps up behind me and wraps his arms around my shoulders like a husband greeting his wife at the end of the workday. “A ghrá.”

“That was quite the dramatic entrance,” I say with a laugh.

Leo rolls his eyes.

“No sign of them,” Topaz announces as she tosses her jacket on the couch. “Oh, are we not doing glamours anymore? Thank the gods.” She removes hers before she disappears into the kitchen.

Rime’s too busy squeezing me and Leo’s too busy glowering at him to acknowledge her.

“Leo’s telling me about Ember,” I say to Rime. “And about weaving with more than one species.”

“It’s reprehensible.” He releases me to clutch the edge of the table. “Did he tell you Brier did it too?”

“Yeah.” I ask him and Leo both, “Is that why he was an exile?”

Leo shakes his head. “No, he was a deoraí because he used his weaving gift for stealing.”

“Rough childhood, unwanted orphan,” Rime explains, his attitude unnaturally blasé. “You know how these things go.”

I know I feel the resentment and bitterness burning in Rime’s chest. What’s the story there?

“He wove with a lynx first,” Leo is saying, still on the subject of Brier. “That’s how he got the gift of stealth.”

“Convenient gift for a thief,” I remark.

Rime snorts.

Leo adds, “And it was while he was still a deoraí that he wove with monkshood.”

“Monkshood?” I’ve heard the name, but I have no idea what it is.

“It’s aconitum, a poisonous plant, also known as the queen of poisons, or wolfsbane.”

“The queen of poisons?” My back goes rigid. “Does that mean he could kill someone by poisoning them?”

Who’s in charge of this weaving business? Shouldn’t there be some sort of checkpoint so bad faeries don’t get dangerous gifts?

“Yes, and so can hundreds of other faeries,” Rime points out. “But they wouldn’t. It’s not our way.”

But it’s Brier’s.

“How do they poison you?” I ask. “By biting you?”

“If they’ve woven with a venomous animal, yes,” Leo answers. “But not fae who’ve woven with poisonous plants. The toxin is in their blood and would have to get into your bloodstream somehow.”

Like a deadly infection or a zombie virus.

I wonder aloud, “Okay, but if double weaving is forbidden and Brier was an outlaw, how did he get the caillecha to do the rite?”

Rime snorts again as he heads for the kitchen. “By smashing half of them.”

“Smashing?” I gasp and look at Leo, mouthing the words, “Does he mean?—?”